Dear Friends:
After the white
supremacy march in Charlottesville, Virginia, as reaction against this act, we saw that a
lot of statues of the generals and soldiers of the Confederate army fell.
A series of
politicians of both aisles of our politics have expressed bad feelings against
“heroes” or “anti-heroes” of our History.
Different groups and
universities continue making protests across the country with different mottos.
Some of these people are defenders of the white supremacy. Others are in the
opposite aisle. In the middle, we find people who see the current events as a
reaction against the spread of the illegal immigration in recent years.
Ironically, a lot of
statues and symbols of the Confederates that left-wing leaders want to remove,
they remained per decades in the squares and public places of cities also
during the periods that the politicians of the Democratic Party were in the
White House.
We know the Civil
War was a gloomy moment of our History, but the parallel that some people make
between the Confederate leaders and Hitler looks an exaggeration.
In addition, several
days ago, the New York City Mayor said that he wants to remove the statues of
Cristobel Columbus of the city. This shows us, how the politicians act in a
silly way.
Also some people are
remembering that George Washington and other heroes of the country had slaves
two or three centuries ago.
Today is not
possible to make judgments about the mistakes or attitudes of people who lived
two or three centuries ago.
And we cannot
rebuild the circumstances that motivated the erection of a series of statues
across the country. For this reason, it does not make sense that the federal
government orders a massive “cleaning” of statues.
Like Vice President
Mike Pence suggested, the decision of the removing of the monuments of the
Confederate leaders must be a decision of each city or community.
From the other side,
we have to remark that the History will no delete the names of the heroes and
anti-heroes of our past.
History always
includes all the events and the protagonists despite their spots and mistakes.
The Union won a war against Confederate troops after
cruel fighting from both sides.
Maybe, in the
writing of new books we can change the “tone” we describe the events, but we
have to recognize that both sides had different arguments that pushed the war.
(It was not a war only about the freedom or non-freedom of the slaves. It was a
war for economic issues with the perspective of two powerful groups of 1860.)
Frequently, the
history books used in the schools were written by the winners of the wars and
for this reason, always the losers are evil. This is a partial view of reality
Some history books
that we read in the schools are like the movies for children: All the losers
are devils and bad guys and the winners are "angels" and great
people.
There are of course,
wars and massacres where the leaders of one side are butchers like the current
terrorist organizations.
But also, in the
terrorist groups, we don’t know if all the terrorists are criminals who came
with evil from the cradle.
Sometimes, good
people become bad people for factors that are very difficult to evaluate from
the big scenery of the media. (For example, an innocent guy who was tortured by
mistake frequently becomes a terrible enemy of his torturers. How many mistakes
commit the intelligence services when they take prisoners? )
The true History is
the description of all the events like they happened, with a serious analysis
of the actions of the protagonists and the circumstances.
In each historic
event, we have to consider different elements: the events in themselves, the
protagonists and the circumstances.
In the cases of
wars, as minimum, we find two enemy groups. Normally, the enemies are motivated
by hates for political, economic, social and/or religious reasons.
The analysis of the
“civil wars” is more complex that the wars between two different countries
because the enemies live together in the same land, sharing domestic issues and
common resources. Frequently, they have families in the two sides. (All the
“civil wars” are terrible cruel. We see today the cases of Syria, Iraq, Afghanistan, Yemen..)
Delete historic
events for bias is negative and doesn’t help to build a better future. The
ignorance about History pushes leaders and common people to repeat the same
mistakes from generations to generations.
Returning to the
vandalism against statues of some protagonists of the American Civil War, it
looks irrational.
If somebody doesn’t
like a statue and the people around him/her agree, it is possible to remove it
in the right way, but a massive destruction of monuments will change nothing
because History will remains with the ghosts dancing during the night around
the monuments without “head” or with the bad spirits in the bronze of the
statues.
Some of the statues
removed from the monuments can go to museums. Normally, the visitors of these
places are people who like to study or with a healthy curiosity about the past.
Maybe, in the
silence of a museum, we can learn to understand history without lethal passion.
With hate we will never build a great nation.
History is the best
teacher the countries have, to go ahead, after the mistakes, suffering and
gloomy moments of our past or present.
Domingo A. Trassens
Email: d.a.trassens@gmail.com
WORLD RETHINK
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(Domingo Trassens)
(More than 10,000
recommendations received from other members since the new Journal Community
started in 2014 and 7900 in the previous JC.)
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HERE SOME OF MY COMMENTS
POSTED IN WSJ – JOURNAL COMMUNITY AND TWITTER ABOUT THIS ISSUE:
From Charlottesville, the disconcert reigns in any place where
somebody has erected a Confederate statue in other time.
08/28/2017 04:28:17 PM
2 Recommendations
Maybe, in the
silence of a museum, we can learn to understand history without lethal passion.
With hate we will never build a great nation.
08/26/2017 08:09:08 PM
2 Recommendations
Through the times,
the history books were written by the winners of the wars and for this reason,
always the losers are evil. This is a partial view of reality.
08/25/2017 10:24:26 PM
2 Recommendations
Important point
about we, (the Americans): "“We’re not a monolith; there are at least 50
shades of gray,”
08/25/2017 10:12:52 PM
2 Recommendations
Statues fall,
History will not change! (More ghosts will walk through the streets without
home.)
08/21/2017 10:21:01 AM
2 Recommendations
We want to "delete"
the spots of our past. Do you have better present now?
08/21/2017 10:09:22 AM
4 Recommendations
In a democracy, we
have to accept pacific protests, but never violence and unrest.
08/20/2017 04:31:47 AM
5 Recommendations
Posted In Refighting
the Civil War
Maybe, we can title
this story as: Re-opening the wounds of the Civil War.
08/19/2017 01:22:09 PM
4 Recommendations
How many
protagonists of the history are "100% clean people"?
08/18/2017 02:49:23 PM
1 Recommendation
In the end, all
these people were part of our History.
08/18/2017 02:27:50 PM
2 Recommendations
We have to start to
accept the protagonists of our History like they were and use their mistakes as
a “lesson” of what we must not do more.
08/17/2017 10:47:15 PM
1 Recommendation
We can change the
“tone” how we describe events and the way we frame the protagonists. But we
cannot delete History. Washington also had slaves.
08/17/2017 10:39:49 PM
1 Recommendation
Dangerous moment! If
our leaders don't manage this craziness, we will walk to a new civil war.
08/16/2017 05:06:35 PM
6 Recommendations
In part, the white
nationalists groups are reaction of the “laissez-faire” politics of the Obama
administration in relation with illegal immigrants and some American-African
groups who went to the street to generate violent unrest.
08/15/2017 12:50:57 AM
Sad images that
reflect the violent moments we are living now. Everybody believes have rights
to complain...
08/13/2017 10:15:38 AM
1 Recommendation
We live in a world
of complete violence and our leaders don’t make the right efforts to go away
the problems.
08/13/2017 09:54:22 AM
1 Recommendation
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SOURCES:
1) My papers of my
studies about history in the university decades ago..
2) My analysis of
the recent news in Wall Street Journal, The New York Times, The Washington Post
and a series of national and international publications from U.K., Canada,
Germany and France.
Website: http://world-rethink.blogspot.com/
